A Long Way to Go for a Sun Tan

Thursday, 21 August 2014

A taxi ride at rush hour through Riyadh’s chaotic traffic
for almost forty minutes brings us to the gateway of one of Riyadh’s better
compounds to the north of the city. Any taxi ride around this city is eventful
to say the least, road etiquette simply doesn’t exist and neither does public
transport, and add in the fact that women are not permitted to drive (though there’s
no specific written law on this !) and that the city has a population of some
six million people, gives you an idea of what traffic can be like here.

It’s Sunday evening, which is the first working day of the
week, and it’s also the beginning of pre-season training for Riyadh’s Naomh Alee Riyadh GAA Club, a fully affiliated
GAA club, founded twenty years ago and a member of the broader Middle East GAA
Family which includes other clubs in UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman & Kuwait.

It’s still around 38 degrees when we start our workout on
the floodlit grass pitch which has just been much sought after these past few seasons,
the group grows to over forty people by the time training kicks off in earnest
at 8pm, which is of course is in complete darkness at this time of the evening
all year around. This session is led by Sean O’Sullivan from Cork, Patrick
Moynagh from Cavan and Tony Robinson from Derry and the participants and club
members come from Dublin, Fermanagh, Clare, Galway, Antrim, Down, Wexford, Offaly, Cavan, Derry, Westmeath, Louth, Meath, Tipperary and a few lads from Cork. It doesn’t
end there of course as a further sizeable contingent in this group and the club
as a whole come from much further afield, such as United Kingdom, Germany,
Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, United States and Jordan. At one point in
the session, one could even hear a strong Australian accent count out “a H-aon, A do, a tri….” while the squad
does press ups.

In recent years, Naomh
Alee Riyadh GAAClub has seen a strong
revival in Riyadh, coinciding with the economic slump back in Ireland which has
brought additional numbers of professionals to the Kingdom securing work in
sectors such as Banking, Construction, Education, Agriculture and Nursing, the
club has seen increased participation and is now running a number of both Men’s
and Ladies Teams in the Middle East League, and competing very consistently and
competitively in the past few years. They provide Gaelic Football only at the
moment, however in its early years in the late 1990’s, it was initially a
hurling club, and there are ambitions to once again field a hurling team in the
future.

This club is like no other in the sense that it doesn’t have
a dedicated pitch and must arrange to use facilities such as this one within a compound,
it also uniquely must travel abroad to play competitive matches given the lack
of any other GAA in the Kingdom at the moment and the difficulties in getting
visa’s to allow a travelling team to come to Riyadh to play the home team, so Noamh Alee Riyadh GAAClub will travel over six weekends over the winter season to
Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Doha and Al Ain to play fixtures in the Middle East
League and other Competitions in the region. It’s a huge commitment from
players and management alike and a great credit to all of them. The Club has
also been very well supported by way of sponsorship from Irish Businesses working
in Saudi Arabia in recent times, such as Jones Engineering Group, Bruce Shaw,
First Staff Recruitment and CCM Recruitment.

Beyond sport however, the Club represents so much more, it’s
a very natural stop off point for Irish emigrants passing through Riyadh , whether
on a long stint here over many years or a one year assignment. It provides a
vital conduit for those just arrived to find out how to make one’s way around this
vast city and integrated into their new surroundings and culture, it’s a vital
sporting and social outlet for the many Irish, British, Australian and New Zealand
nurses who play on the ladies squad, and a great way of building and sustaining
the Irish Community in Riyadh, fostering new friendships and also having some
great fun.

Naomh Alee Riyadh GAA Club
also run a Juvenile programme for young boys and girls to take up the sport. They
also promote Irish culture and with the on-going support of the Irish Embassy,
has been to the forefront of all things Irish in Riyadh.

The session finishes up just before 10pm with a warm down
led by Tony, and the exhausted and rather sweaty group of people head off into the
Riyadh night chatting as they go, off to recover, get home, have a shower and a
good sleep before the next day’s work and the next training session the
following Wednesday…….

If you are Interested in participating in Gaelic Football, want to stay
fit and also get to know more people in Riyadh, or maybe you are considering a
move to Riyadh soon, get in touch, as the club is always looking for new
members and is here to help….

Monday, 30 June 2014

Sitting in Bahrain Airport the other day, waiting for a
flight back to Riyadh and sipping on a cold beer, that old familiar feeling returned
that I know so well, here I go again back to Riyadh, starting back to another
year in the Kingdom, and reflecting on how transient and different and
sometimes lonely life has become in the
last few years…

July 2011, I left Ireland to take up a posting on a remote Military
base in Afghanistan, Its now three years later, I’m working in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia,
and life is so different to what it was ten years ago

I can only describe the last few years as a mixture of adventure,
relief, grief, a sense of a transient lifestyle, sometimes loneliness, always
interesting but to be absolutely frank, a world completely turned upside down
from where I was ten years ago.

Back in 2004, I was married, I had just set up my own
business, I was Dad to a two year old son and was anticipating the arrival of a
second , was about to go on holiday to Lake Garda in Italy which turned out to
be a fantastic trip abroad that summer. I can still remember having Daithi perched
on my shoulders heading off for pizza in
the warm evenings.

This is not where I now compare life to the present day and bemoan
the cards I’ve been dealt, that is of no use to me or indeed to you the reader
and I actually believe I’ve been fairly fortunate, though the ride has certainly been rough at
times and like many things, some aspects are positive, others not so.

The Financial meltdown from 2008 was a massive blow to
Ireland, and its repercussions are still being felt, though there are now signs
of recovery in parts, primarily the greater Dublin area and also Cork. This is
certainly to be welcomed, though I personally would have concerns about other
Irish towns such as Limerick for example where recovery is somewhat slower and
I belong to an industry that was effectively wiped out and will take some time
to recover properly back home.

My experience of the years from 2008 to 2011 was of running
a business which was less than five years old and seeing turnover literally
collapse by 80% in two months, Its only now when I look back, i appreciate how dramatic
that was for business owners up and down the country and the effects it had on families
and local communities, right up to this day and beyond in the form of failed
businesses, unemployment and for many of us, emigration.

When I finally gave up on the business in 2011 after doing
as much as I could possibly do to keep it alive and to also re-invent myself
for other roles, it came with a huge sense of failure, that you have let your
staff down, your family down, you deny it and try to battle on, but it’s
actually a huge sense of failure which can lead to a dark place if it’s not
addressed.

Emigration has been a way back, a sort of redemption, a
return in confidence, not something I had anticipated in the first year when
based in Afghanistan and with confidence, comes perspective again and a new
focus on the future. I have recovered a lot of lost ground financially
thankfully, and have relocated here to Riyadh since 2012 with an Irish Company
and I have much to be grateful for and which I am.

The change is challenging, there is very little
one can do about it other than adapt. Here in Riyadh, its very transient,
people (particularly ex-pats) come and go fairly regularly, Its incredibility hot,(
43 this week), it lacks a sense of place for a lot of us and its culture and
societal norms can take a lot of getting used to by comparison to other near-by
countries. I have formed new friendships and relationships, I’ve sadly lost
others, but life is going on and there is much to look forward to also. My boys
are growing bigger and smarter, the banks now write polite letters to me (wasn’t
expecting that, and to be honest, I don’t take it too seriously either), I get
more time off than I used to in my own business, I’ve visited a lot of
countries I never expected to and have come to understand the Middle East so
much more than I did before, and on the other side, yes, It’s been a struggle
at times, I really do miss home and look forward to the day when I can return
and re-establish a life in Ireland. Now there’s something to look forward to.

"It doesn't matter which side of the fence you get off on sometimes, What matters most is getting off. You cannot make progress without making decisions" - Jim Rohn

Wednesday, 18 June 2014

I am just about to commence my fourth year away from Ireland
and am already into my third here in Saudi Arabia, where does the time go ? Its
been a time of great change for me both personally and professionally and I’m
often asked what I miss most...

My Sons

The recent trip to UAE with Daithi & Oisin was
amazing and we all enjoyed it hugely and it won’t be long before the next trip
back to Ireland for a trip to West Cork, but of course, it doesn’t replace the
school homework, eating together, going to the movies and regular “tickling
fights”, though we do our best to catch up on those when I’m home !

Talk Radio

I’m always struck at how little radio exists here in Riyadh,
everything from music to chat show, yes, there are some but very limited and
certainly don’t replace some of the shows I used to listen to back home, "The Last Word" with Matt Cooper was a
favourite of mine in the evenings , with great discussions on current affairs,
sports and the odd wacky interview with a “Healy-Rae” about pot holes or drink
driving or Kilgarvan hosting the World Cup as an alternative to Qatar…

The Pint

Saudi Arabia is a “dry” country so I really miss the Friday
eveningPint of Guinness, or a few
watching Munster in the Rugby or Clare in the hurling….

Tay

When I was a child, there was no coffee and even when there
was, it was in a jar and tasting “horrific”, however there was always “Tay”,
and copious amounts of it for every possible punctuation in the day, for every
chat, or break. You can get Tea here of course its just not the same as Barry's Teaor the like which we were all reared on back home.
The suitcase on the return journey to Riyadh is always packed up with at least 80/100 teabags
to see me through to the next juncture.

Friends

Though I have made many new friends here in the Kingdom, and
we do socialise as much as we can, It just doesn’t replace meeting friends you
have had for many years. I left Ireland later in life like others as a result
of the economic problems, it wasn’t ever my plan, so I've left behind
many good friends and I struggle to catch up in person on trips home and relying on Skype
and Facebook is just not the same as meeting in person and finding out how
things are with them.

I'm sure this list could go on and on, its just a few of the things that I miss, some small and some far more significant......

Friday, 2 May 2014

It’s been almost three years now since I left home to come
and work in the Middle East region, and I’ve mentioned many times here how I
miss my sons, who are now 11 & 9. We had a great trip last summer to London
and it was there that we hatched a plan to do a trip to Dubai in 2014.

So on April 11th last, I took a flight from
Riyadh to Dubai and arrived there just before my two sons boarded an Emirates
flight from Dublin for the first time on their own, to meet me in Dubai.

It’s a strange feeling knowing your children are in the air
on their own for over seven hours, an odd feeling where they’re not in either
parents care, rather un-nerving…

Late that evening, in fact after midnight, I waited
anxiously at Terminal 3 at Dubai Airport and along they both came to arrivals,
cool as you like, as only boys of that age can be, “Hi Dad”, an incredible
feeling, here they were, in “my world” after 3 years, a great feeling of pride,
my two sons, older, bigger, confident, discovering the world, a very emotional
moment that will stay long in the memory.

What followed was an amazing week, a road trip around the
United Arab Emirates in which they discovered and ran free in the sand dunes of
Al Ain, rode the fastest roller-coaster in the world in Abu Dhabi, walked
through the beautiful Sheikh Zayed Mosque, went to the 124th floor
of the world’s tallest building in Dubai, visited the Souks and bought a
traditional Kandoura, Gutra and Agal (Traditional Emerati Clothing), and took a
boat trip across the Dubai Creek.

It meant so much to me to share this time with my lads, as
it wasn’t that long ago when I doubted whether I could ever take them on
holiday at all, given the difficult times back home. Daithi & Oisin went back
to Dubai Airport after their week, at least 2 inches taller in their sense of
confidence and sense of discovery and adventure, yes, a poignant moment, but also a
great moment. Simply an
Amazing week…..

Monday, 23 December 2013

This will be my second time spending Christmas away from
home, I spent one in Germany some years back and it snowed and was good fun, it
was a change from the normal Christmas chaos that goes on back home.

This is my third Christmas as an Emigrant now, though my
first not being home in Ireland to see the boys open Santa’s gifts on Christmas
morning, however, I will be home just after Christmas and before New Year’s
Eve.

Christmas here in Saudi, well, just isn’t really Christmas !, the word isn’t used
at all in this devoutly Islamic country, I’ve heard many references in recent
week s to “end of year holidays” or “December vacation”. Unlike UAE, for
example, even the commercial aspects of the season aren’t really apparent here,
so you can actually just get on with life and forget about it until you’re on
that flight home, which is pretty much my strategy this year !

The Muslim Holidays of Eid-Al-Fitr & Eid-Al-Adha are the
big family holidays here and those of you who are familiar with the Hijri
Calender will also know that the dates of these holidays move backwards every
year as the calendar is lunar and not solar as the gregorian one is. This is
the time of year, when you will see the street decorated and plenty of business
being done at the shopping malls and families preparing for large gatherings at
home, sound familiar ?

Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, Abu Dhabi, UAE

The Region is however not without some festive cheer, in the
last few weeks, I’ve had the pleasure of our Christmas Party in Dubai, eating
outdoors by the Marina in very un-Christmassy weather, also a wonderful
Breakfast at the Irish Embassy here in Riyadh, a smaller festive gathering of
some Irish ex-pats and a really nice trip to Abu Dhabi last weekend to catch up
with some old friends and also visit the famous Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque.

I am of course however, really looking forward to seeing my
boys in Ireland in a few days, even if it’s after Christmas Day, to catch up on
what Santa brought, eat together, talk together and catch up, also a chance to
catch up with others close friends on the short visit home. It’s amazing how Ireland
has changed so much in the past few years and how so many are taking similar
trips home this time of year, and sadly others who either can’t go home for
Christmas or can’t get out of Ireland either to find work and improve their
lot.

As for snow, well as you can see from this photo taken in
the northern region near Tabuk, it does snow in Saudi Arabia !!!

Thursday, 4 July 2013

An Article I wrote for thejournal.ie – 3rd
July 2013

After living in Afghanistan, I got to
see first-hand what the people of that country go through, writes Noel Scanlon,
who says he wishes he could be more optimistic about the country’s future.

IMAGINE FOR A moment what it feels
like to be within a few hundred metres of bomb blast. I had this experience
back in 28 July 2011, just one month after arriving at the Forward
Operating Base at Tarin Kowt, Uruzgan, Afghanistan.

A group of insurgents attacked the
government’s compound not far from the Main Gate to the Base at midday with
lots of locals about. More than 20 people lost their lives that day, many of
them innocent women and children, and a local BBC correspondent.

This was a moment that will forever
stay with me from my time in Afghanistan, a normal hot July day, temperatures
running over 50, still struggling to adjust to the new strange and alien
environment I was now working in.

Bomb blasts

Suddenly a blast, which you instantly
knew was not the “normal” controlled explosions that regularly happened on
base, went off. This did not have a warning and had that shock factor about it,
that puts fear in you. Here I was in the middle of this never-ending and nasty
conflict – here we had Afghan killing Afghan.

I reflect on my time in the country
from where I’m now based here in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, particularly when I
heard about the formal handing-over of security control to the Afghan
government and the recognition of the Taliban’s new office in Qatar, along with
the announcement of imminent talks with both the US and the Afghan government.

The real impact of these past 12
years is on the country’s people, on their lifestyle, their expectations, their
incomes and their families. These are a grizzled and tough people who have
known nothing else only war, conflict and poverty for over 30 years. What will
these latest developments mean for them?

Ismael – a hard worker with
enthusiasm

Ismael is from Tarin Kowt and worked
with us on the Base every day, he would arrive each morning around 8am after
taking an hour to get through the regular and rigorous security checks and
would immediately change out of his traditional dish-dash into jeans and a
branded t-shirt that we had given him and then set about his daily chores with
great enthusiasm.

His job was to clean the public
areas, toilets, recreation room, showers and the office, and then would assist
in the kitchen with preparing vegetables and assisting our Indian cook for
lunch. His hard work and enthusiasm always impressed me and he would only stop
to eat dinner and pray. His English was not so good but he always came with a
broad smile every morning and would ask Abdul to communicate with me about how
much he like working for us and the difference it was making for his family.

In the evenings he would collect the
leftover cardboard and packaging waste that we had and would set off back home
to his family with it which would be used for bedding and fuel. I also
recall returning once from leave and meeting him and being greeted with a warm
smile, handshake and a hug, and he was bursting with excitement to tell me that
he was getting married and was again thanking me that it was his work with us
that allowed this to happen, as marriage here involves payment of a “dowry” to
the family of the bride.

He arrived a little late one morning
and was without his normal warm smile, I enquired through others later in the
day who explained to me that an IED (Improvised Explosive Device) had been left
in a trash can in the town and that Ismael’s uncle has been working close by
when it exploded and killed him. This unfortunately is life for an Afghan,
random, ruthless and unforgiving.

Abdul – fluent in six languages and a
good businessman

Abdul is from Kabul, a father of ten,
and also worked with me in Tarin Kowt, Uruzgan. He was one of my primary
suppliers and someone I had to build a working relationship with early on as
getting building materials, fuel, transport to and from Kandahar and indeed
food were absolutely crucial for us on camp.

Abdul is a qualified engineer having
studied in Russia and spoke fluent Russian, Pashtu, English, Dari , Farsi and
Urdu. He loved to visit regularly and always wanted to talk about his love of
music and dancing (and indeed would often demonstrate his dancing abilities
around the office). He worked hard under very stressful conditions and was
always positive, he was a good businessman and understood our need to have
materials on time and he loved nothing more than a good old haggle over some
lunch in our camp kitchen.

He spoke proudly of his children, and
even more proudly that he had five of his daughters going to university, this
meant everything to him and was the reason why he came from Kabul in the north
to work here in the hostile south, people like Abdul are the exception rather
than the rule and he yearned for a time when Afghanistan’s youth could have
sustainable education and where they could re-build the country.

Sadly, he was also pessimistic and
had a view that regardless of what NATO and Karzai got up to, the real power in
the country was with the local warlords who were now being legitimised and
given uniforms and titles such as Chief of Police or Governor, and that
ultimately these were power hungry local chiefs who lacked the vision and
leadership to really make a difference in the country. A very impressive man
that I still think about sometimes.

Over 30 years of conflict

Afghanistan is now over 30 years in a
state of conflict of some kind or other – be it the Soviets, their own internal
factions, the Taliban, or indeed the US/NATO/ISAF in more recent years.

So what will these new developments
do for the Abduls and Ismaels of Afghanistan? In my opinion, very little and if
anything, it’s even possible that their lives will become even more
challenging. The Multi-National Base at Tarin Kowt is being demobilised as I
write this and will be handed over to Afghan control along with most other
Forward Operating Bases in the country. Gone with them will be the business
opportunities for Abdul and Ismael’s employment and, some would say, also the
security that was provided by NATO.

This is a harsh land where making a
living is difficult at the very best of times and we now have a scenario where
the Afghan government have to take control of security – a task that many say
is either many years off or even beyond their capabilities entirely.

I know that this outlook is somewhat
pessimistic, and I genuinely feel that the people of the country deserve much
more than this and have been let down by so many people in the past, however
it’s a honest personal view from my experience of being there, and I can only
wish the very best for my colleagues Abdul and Ismael.

Tuesday, 2 July 2013

Last week, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz bin Saud of Saudi Arabia decreed that the weekend in the Kingdom would align itself with its Gulf neighbours (Friday / Saturday) from the normal Thursday / Friday weekend in Saudi Arabia, which means we had the advantage of a three day weekend last week so we took the opportunity to take a road trip to Bahrain…..

Bahrain is a small country made up of islands that sit just off the east coast of Saudi Arabia close to the cities of Dammam and Al Khobar in the Eastern Province. Its just a little larger than the Isle of Mann and has a population of 1.2 million, some 500,00 of whom are non- Bahraini’s, so it feels a lot like its Gulf neighbours, United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

King Fahad Causeway

It is connected by bridge / causeway to Saudi Arabia via the King Fahad Causeway which was built back in 1986, so one can drive from the Riyadh to Manama, the capital of Bahrain in five or six hours.

We set off (four of us) in a hire car from Riyadh at 4:30am on Thursday morning last, heading eastwards on the large open highway through the desert, and took an early coffee at one of the rather chaotic, stark and rather untidy service stops, the logic for the early start being that we knew that traffic volumes hitting the causeway at the weekends can be high and given we had a longer weekend, was likely to be much busier.

Manama Skyline

We hit the Causeway in four hours and parked up the car at the border which is in fact on a man-made island halfway across (the causeway is some 24 km), where we met our pre-arranged Bahraini taxi and were over the formalities in about 30 mins and by 11am were in our hotel in Manama relaxing, we later heard that the afternoon queues at the Causeway were running at five hour delays…

Bahrain is a typically modern Arabian city with a very multi-national feel to it, there are some very fine hotels, restaurants and bars and we even found a rugby club to watch the Lions second test against Australia on Saturday afternoon before we returned back to the Kingdom….a good weekend.

Tuesday, 18 June 2013

I attended a really
excellent presentation last evening at the Irish Embassy by Ms. Salwa
Al Qunaibit , who is the owner and driving force behind Haya Tours,
a business she founded a few years back .

Tourism in Saudi
Arabia is in its infancy and as Salwa explained in her presentation, needs a
lot of development and support.

She spoke how on her
visits to Ireland where her children came to summer school to learn English,
she came across various bus tours and day trip operators such as Paddywagon Tours were major influencers
on how she envisioned how Haya Tours would be run.

Haya operate city
trips, day trips and weekend trip right across the Kingdom, from trips around
Riyadh to visit Masmak Castle, Shoura Council and Al-Diriyah to more
adventurous trips to Al Ahsa and the UNESCO site at Mada’in Saleh.

Salwa spoke about the
use of local Saudi tour guides to provide the most authentic travel guide
experience with expert knowledge of the history and culture of the various
provinces.

She also explained
that the Arabic word “Haya” essentially means, “Lets Go”, her presentation was
very impressive and I was taken by her passion and vision for the business ,
her aims of building effective Teamwork between the various Governement
Officials and other stakeholders for the future and her desire to see the
industry develop in the Kingdom.

I wish her well and
would ask you to view the site and the excursions offered here….

Monday, 17 June 2013

I’ve been struck in my time in the Kingdom at the
problem of obesity here, just on visual evidence, there is a larger than normal
proportion of adults that are clearly overweight, I have discovered that the
result of all this is that Saudi Arabia has the world’s highest prevalence of
Diabetes, with figures between 25% - 30% of adults having the condition. Studies are calling it an epidemic...

Diet and lack of exercise are given as major factors in
Diabetes and this is clearly evident living here. The over-bearing conditions
and urbanization of the country in the last 30 years have made the cities very “car
orientated” with very few public parks or pedestrian areas to walk and exercise
has made people much more sedentary.

I have only seen about three areas in the city where you
could actually go for a walk, and that’s in a city with over five million
inhabitants, cycling here would be like playing Russian roulette as there are
no lanes or parks to cycle and even less driving skills and etiquette on the road.

Saudi culture is also not necessarily supportive of women exercising
and sport among females is seen as taboo, remember all the media noise about
the first Saudi female athletes at the last Olympics, this means that it’s not
at all straight forward for females to exercise in any kind of open manner
though I understand that this is changing…

The other major factor here is diet and as I shop regularly
here in Riyadh, I’m completely taken aback at the sheer volume of chocolate,
cakes, and sugar laden food on the shopping shelves, its actually startling,
the picture above was taken in a typical Riyadh Supermarket….shelves and
shelves of the stuff……

Saudi Arabia, having been very influenced by American culture
is also overrun with Fast Food outlets, they are literally everywhere in every
city, McDonalds, Dunkin-Donuts are on every street and every mall and you have
to look a bit harder to find the healthier options……

I'm not saying that I know better as I've seen similar issues back home in Ireland but here given the culture and climate is certainly at a different scale and is something that definitely needs to be tackled.......

About Me

Where do I
start.......I am from Co. Clare in the West of Ireland, grew up in East Clare
in a rural background, raised by foster parents on a farm which I remember I
really liked, studied at Limerick Institute of Technology, and later at VIA
University in Horsens, Denmark, returned home, worked for a few different
Architectural Practices, designed and built a home in East Clare, Iam a proud father of 2 wonderful boys, Daithí
& Oisín, I founded my own business in 2003, which sadly went the wayside in
2011 after the crash of 2008, worked with BNI from 2007 to 2011, and made the
big jump into the unknown to work in Afghanistan in 2011, as a direct result of
the worsening economic conditions at home, that led on to a position in Riyadh,
Saudi Arabia where I am at the moment, I started blogging in 2011 as a way of
staying connected to family and friends back home while I was working in the
Southern Afghan desert.......so here I am, A Long Way to go for a Sun Tan......